by Michael Hogan

by Quincy D. Newell

Jane Elizabeth Manning James, a free black woman who converted to Mormonism in the early 1840s, provides a little-known vantage point from which to tell a story of Mormonism that takes the church’s racial history into account.

The PBS film features stories from a number of African-American entrepreneurs, including several Chicagoans who played key roles in various industries, from journalist Ida B. Wells to publisher John H. Johnson.